Albert Lin is one of the explorers in Welcome to Earth, a new Disney+ and National Geographic series that follows Will Smith on some wild journeys. In his episode, Lin takes Smith to the desert of Namibia and they explore massive sand dunes, travel over a canyon by rope, and explore another by rappelling into it.
Screen Rant spoke with Albert Lin about his expedition, including the incredible technology he uses to capture some of the wildlife in the desert, the worry he had bringing Will Smith over a canyon by rope, and the time they shaved in the back of the car together before the cameras began to roll.
Screen Rant: You've done some crazy stuff already for National Geographic - looking for the tomb of Genghis Khan, exploring unmapped regions of China and Guatemala. Where does your experience in Namibia with Will Smith rank among all of those jobs?
Albert Lin: A lot of those other expeditions were just me and a small crew running around the deepest parts of the jungle, getting lost looking for these worlds that are hidden in the depths of all these things. This one was like that, but I happen to have one of my childhood heroes and lifetime superstars right next to me the whole time like a buddy. It felt like I was on this road trip with one of my best friends. But I happen to have the world's best cinematographers all around us the whole time filming it and that best friend happened to be this guy named Will Smith. So it was me that was like, "What is going on? Is this real?"
Watching you guys go across the canyon, were you ever like, "Oh my God, if Will Smith falls, it's gonna be my fault and I'm gonna freak out."
Albert Lin: Yeah, there was a couple. There were a few moments like that. Because we had no idea what was gonna be on the other end of that. We had to only get there by sending a drone across with this line and then pulling the rope around this massive bow of a baobab tree. When we started going across it was like, "Is this gonna work?" There was definitely that moment of like, "What's gonna happen here?"
There was actually a moment when we were down in this cave, about 400 feet down in this pitch-black cave. And we started SCUBA diving into one of the world's largest subterranean lakes, which I really don't know where the bottom of this thing is. It's never been mapped because it's so deep. And it's crystal clear water. So it's a little bit of altitude. So it's really hard to figure out your depth in the water when you're scuba diving. And it's hard to figure out your buoyancy, too. So I do remember at one point seeing Will start to descend in a way that I was like, "Uh-oh, what's going to happen? Are we ever going to see him again?" And switch[ing] from me being like, "Oh, this is Will Smith, mega-superstar", to being like, "Oh, this is a friend, this human being is [in an] incredibly intense place trying to survive." And when we got to the surface, I asked him how he stayed calm because he didn't descend to the bottom, he was able to [compose] himself and figure it out. And he was just telling me about his childhood.
His parents said never to freak out about anything. His dad used to take them to work with him to do high-powered electricity work. His dad said to never freak out in any situation. And at that point, it wasn't Will Smith, the actor, I was just looking at the person. That was wild. That was an incredible bonding moment in the face of danger.
How do you mentally and physically prepare for an expedition like this where you're bringing along someone who doesn't know the environment or the risks like you do?
Albert Lin: Yeah, it's tricky, right? Because you kind of want to see if you can help take care of somebody in a situation like that. But whenever, almost immediately when I met Will, all the mental preparation sort of just evaporated. It was just high-fives and jokes the whole time. He's a really cool guy, actually in person. It doesn't feel like there's a lot to bear. He's actually incredibly humble and quite fearless.
So in all these situations, for me, it's more about letting the awe of what I'm about to experience put away the fear of any given moment. I think that's the explorer in all of us. I think that that was deeply seated in Will already, otherwise, he wouldn't be doing a show like this. So at the end of the day, it didn't feel like I was carrying him along, it felt like we're there together.
What do you hope people take away from your episode of Welcome to Earth?
Albert Lin: I've had the really incredible experience in life of being able to see things through the lens of technology that is actually happening all around us, but we just might not see because of how our brain works or how our eyes work, or our senses. In my early career, I started out using lasers and kind of mapped jungles or using satellites that look at different signatures in the visual and nonvisual spectrums. We could look for Lost Cities and things like this, right?
The same thing exists in the scales of time, and the world around us is this dynamic, magical place that's constantly changing. That might be the one single most important factor in my life, the realization that everything is impermanent, everything is changing. Everything is moving - from the mountains to the waterfalls. And I think when you start to look at things and different times, you'll see and feel that, which is what the show really does.
I think you start to realize just how special any given moment is. I did not take that for granted. I think while I was with Will, one of the most pleasant conversations we had been having was about being present, and about appreciating those individual moments. I think if the viewer walks away from watching this having inspiration in not only this incredible planet that we're on but also the moment that we're experiencing on this planet, then they'll experience what I felt.
Was that always something you wanted to do, bringing this advanced technology out there to widen the lens of what we're seeing?
Albert Lin: I ended up getting a couple of degrees in engineering. So I started out as an engineer because I like tinkering with things. I always loved tinkering with things. And I learned more and more that engineering and technology, really, it's all part of our human imagination. We come up with this stuff and then we are able to see or explore the world [through] new lenses, given these advances, these tools. But it starts with curiosity. What is it that you really want to see anyway? So it doesn't really matter about the technology, the technology is going to become obsolete, and then you know, faster and faster every single year, and you're gonna get new technology. But what keeps me going is that core question of what's out there. And I think that's the explorer in us.
I learned halfway through my career that National Geographic was founded by one of the most iconic engineers of our time, this guy named Alexander Graham Bell, who invented the telephone. So founded in part by him and a couple of other folks. But that just tells you that technology and engineering have been a part of exploration through history. They allow us to go over barriers, to look beyond, but we have to know why we're going beyond. We have to know what we're looking for in the first place. And that I think is really at the heart of it all for me.
Was there anything super fun or super exciting that didn't make the final cut of the episode?
Albert Lin: There are definitely some moments that I know were behind the scenes. I remember I showed up to the set one time I showed up and I've forgotten - we're doing really intense days, we're talking about before dawn to sunset or past sunset every single day in these extreme locations, and I forgot to shave one day. And I was like, "Oh, what am I going to do?" And Will hands me his razor because he's shaving right there, too. So we're shaving together with a shared razor in the back of this truck. Like, this is happening right now with Will Smith. I'm shaving with a shared razor behind this truck in the middle of the desert in Namibia. I don't think that made the cut.
Hypothetically speaking, Welcome to Earth gets a season 2 and Will Smith's back, where would you take him? What would you show him? Would you push him further? Where do you want to go next?
Albert Lin: Oh, you know, the world's wide open? Let's go. Let's go beyond, let's go to the moon. No, I'm just kidding. It feels like there's another adventure to be had around every single door. And I think at this point, it's like, Will showed that he's an explorer and he's ready to go. So maybe we'd have to ask him where does he want to go next because he's got it in him. He's a natural-born explorer. And that's something I learned on this show. It's an incredible experience when you actually watch it. And when you actually see this because you actually feel like you're there with him.
And I think that's because Will himself is handling the inner explorer in all of us. It's the most accessible thing you can do is put yourself out of your comfort zone and go and try to be really open-hearted in a place that you've never been. I hope that everybody that watches this feels that and then they go out and then make their own season 2 in other parts of the world. Make their own adventures as well. Because I think the more that we appreciate how magical this planet is, the more we'll appreciate our role and responsibility on this planet.
Welcome to Earth is available to stream on Disney+ starting December 8.